In all cases, direct traffic to ‘pirate’ sites plummeted when ISPs implemented court-ordered blockades. And despite being blocked in March 2013 and taking a large hit in direct traffic, KickassTorrents maintained its place in the top 10. Three sites were identified as the most popular among UK users in August 2014 – watchseries.lt (link), putlocker.is (link) and nowvideo.sx (host), with the former maintaining the number one position for the previous six months. The report breaks sites down into three categories – linking only sites (the majority of sites in the top 250), public P2P portals and hosting. And, when compared to the global control, usage of pirate sites had declined over time. Overall the 26 page report, which relies heavily on Alexa data, found that blocking had resulted in targeted sites losing an average 73.2% of their direct traffic. The report, titled ‘Site Blocking Efficacy Study United Kingdom’ is dated Septemand focuses on the top 250 “open access” websites involved in the unauthorized distribution of film and television content. The report has never been made public but TorrentFreak has now obtained a copy. The UK was hit particularly hard and now dozens of sites are inaccessible via regular means.īut the big question remains – is this an effective way to reduce piracy? Earlier this year the movie studios decided to find out by hiring a company called Incopro to conduct a study. Then, on top of sending millions of DMCA-style takedown notices to sites and search engines, entertainment companies went to court in several regions to have domains blocked at the ISP level. At the consumer end, so-called “strikes” programs saw errant Internet subscribers receive warning notices in an effort to correct their behaviors. During 2014, several key strategies emerged to lead the mainstream entertainment industries’ anti-piracy efforts.

The chameleons torrent